Christian Gospel Singer Natalie Grant on Infertility, Postpartum Depression, and Life with Three Girls
Christian gospel singer Natalie Grant with her husband, Bernie Herms, and their three daughters. Photo by Natalie Grant/Instagram
Gospel singer Natalie Grant will be the first to tell you that it takes a village to raise a child. The Grammy-nominated artist and mother of three daughters has been open for years about the help she’s had with her family, from the fertility specialists who helped her conceive to the counselors who supported her as she battled postpartum depression to the nanny she says is a part of her family. “We are not built to do life alone,” she tells Yahoo Parenting. So perhaps it’s no surprise that Grant has found her latest career success as the host of “It Takes a Church,” the game show where an entire congregation chips in to help one parishioner find a love connection. “It’s great TV — I can actually watch it with my daughters, so I’m really proud of that.”
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Between her hosting duties and music career and kids and husband, Grant admits she’s juggling a lot. “But isn’t every woman?” she says. “I don’t know that there’s such a thing as balance. People always ask me how I keep all the plates spinning without crashing. But the plates do crash every now and then, you just have to be comfortable with the fact you can’t do it all.”
Grant says she’s made a decision that no matter how hectic her life gets, she won’t let her marriage to music producer Bernie Herms or her kids suffer. “We all look at our busy lives and think the busyness happened to us. It didn’t. We chose it,” she says. “We have to remember that we choose our priorities, and I may not choose well everyday, but hopefully I learn from my mistakes. I make a conscious decision in my life that my relationships with my husband and my children will not suffer.”
Natalie Grant with her 4-year-old daughter, Sadie. Photo by Bernie Herms/Instagram.
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Since the birth of her 8-year-old twins Grace and Isabella, Grant has been honest about how hard it was to create her family in the first place. “I’m a faith-based music artist,” she says. “It would be hard to claim that and not be true to who I really am. And there’s such an increasing number of women facing infertility struggles these days, I know that I have more friends that struggle with fertility than don’t.” Grant says being forthright about that fact that she conceived her twins through IVF is especially important for her fan base. “In the faith-based world, especially, people are often waiting for a miracle, and they don’t get treatment because they think if it’s meant to be the Creator will give them a child,” she says. “But I think the Creator works through modern medicine, and we’re so lucky to live in a world where we can get help. So I chose to be open with my struggles in hopes it could help others.”
That kind of honesty has come to characterize Grant’s motherhood journey. After her daughters were born, the singer battled post-partum depression, which she sang about in her 2013 hit “Hurricane.” “More than anything I’ve talked about in my career, that is the thing that has allowed me the most connection with my fans,” she says. “A lot of times you feel like you can’t talk about it – how can you say out loud that you weren’t prepared or that you don’t want to hold the baby? It makes you feel like a despicable human being, and women suffer privately because we’re so ashamed to say it out loud. Being honest about it was the start of recovery for me.”
Singer Natalie Grant takes a Spring Break selfie with her three daughters. Photo by Natalie Grant/Instagram
Years later (Grant has since given birth to 4-year-old daughter Sadie), the singer’s best trick to being a good mom is taking time for herself. “A lot of mothers forsake themselves for their children and they think that’s honorable. But I’ve reconciled that being a little bit selfish makes me a better mom,” she says. “When I invest in myself, I’m a better human being.”
And with three girls at home, Grant says she needs all the patience she can get. “I pray more than I ever have in my life!” she jokes. “There is so much drama. I knew the teenage years would come for us, but I wasn’t prepared for the drama to start so young. I don’t remember having girl drama at 4, 5 or 6 years old. There’s such a range of emotions, from absolute glee to on the floor and distraught at a moment’s notice.”
Still, these days Grant says she is nothing but grateful. “I used to hold a hairbrush and sing to my stuffed animals and it turned into a real microphone and a real audience,” she says. “I look at my life as a gift.”
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